AirPods don't “just work”

Post by silent_cal » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 2:52 PM UTC

chii wrote: post #156

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Y’know what headphones really did “just work” though? Wired headphones, circa 2017. Their battery life was infinite. You could “pair” them in seconds to any device with a headphone jack, aka any device, because we’re in 2017. Oh, and they were cheaper and better for the environment. Courage, indeed. And this is why I’m currently typing my comment on an iPhone 6S...

I used to be like you. Then i tried, for real, a pair of bluetooth headphones. The disadvantages of the bluetooth is by far outweighed by the wireless advantage. The mobility, flexibility and convenience of no tangles and accidental wire pulling and causing phone to drop - all worth it. And wireless UX is only going to get better. Wired is dead.

Post by muttled » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 2:52 PM UTC

emilecantin wrote: post #204

macNchz wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of my roommate’s Jambox bluetooth speaker years ago…I learned that it had this behavior while fully asleep at 4:30am after we’d had a party, when, every few minutes it started loudly blasting “BOOOOP. LOW BATTERY” alerts. The trouble was that it was hidden somewhere in our messy living room, and the alerts weren’t frequent enough to find it quickly, so I was standing around in my underwear for ages, waitin…

Sounds like the small slice of hell that is a low battery in most smoke detectors: one short (and loud AF) beep every ~15 minutes. Fine when you have only one, but in a large house you never know which one of these f*ckers is actually the one complaining.

Post by toxik » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 2:52 PM UTC

deltarholamda wrote: post #88

dt2m wrote: post #63

All valid annoyances, but I really think OP should try using another brand of Bluetooth headphones for a week just to get some perspective of how well AirPods "just work" compared to the competition. Manually having to re-pair once in every blue moon, one earbud playing while the other isn't, no automatic device switching without having to go through the Settings app everytime, A/V desync, dodgy mic quality, earbuds…

As much as people hate wires, I have to say that I much appreciate the "just works" aspect of it. Even wifi, while it has improved an awful lot over the years, is not nearly as reliable as the (albeit annoying) ethernet cable. I have the same issue with wireless keyboards and mice. The idea that I have to charge or put batteries into my mouse is infuriating.

Post by lotsofpulp » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 2:53 PM UTC

justinator wrote: post #82

lotsofpulp wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish HN had a dark mode option.

Whip up some css to your liking and inject it into hn's HTML - there's lots of examples of people doing things like that.

Post by criddell » Wed, Jan 26, 2022, 2:53 PM UTC

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #213

dimmke wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also pretty much confirmed at this point that the next pair of AirPods won't be using bluetooth - which they will get a lot of shit for but is probably necessary to address a lot of these issues.

That also further increases the interoperability problem though, if I can't use my headphones with non-Apple devices even after going through the pairing dance. (Unless Apple uses some other open protocol, which I doubt!)